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900 yeAARs of AARs (part 4)

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AND NOW TO CONCLUDE THE SOAP

The last AAR (1/5)​
Kuipy (Normandy)​

A ugly monstruosity of stone and concrete, Castle Dyfed stood on a crag of Welsh granite, unbroken for centuries, the traditional refuge of the Norman royal family in time of war. If anybody could storm it though, it would seem to be the six rough riders who stepped out of two Renart muscle cars. Behind their hulking shoulders general Richard de Normandie almost looked like a child. And yet his lieutenant Lovell Grant still towered over them. At over fifty the brute's hair was turning grey, his gigantic body bore the scars.

" Your old king here ?" he asked.
" We'll find soon enough. And with the French landed in Britain, God help us if he is'nt."

At the first guard post they were disarmed and searched, before the head of security came to see them. He was an old salt in perfect uniform, with neatly-trimmed sideburns and a stiff upper lip.
" Do you know where the king is ?" Richard asked curtly. Stuffy or not, the other man was obviously in such predicament as to dispense with protocol too.
" I wish I did. He left with a handful of Thug guards, though I begged him not to."
" Left ? Why?"
" He recieved an encoded letter from general Rollon, Intelligence Department."
When Richard saw the paper he jumped.
" It's a code of the North America Army !" He started to decipher, mumbling. "...Were looking everywhere... just before our eyes all along... Your son Hugues... In London... London ! You idiot, you let him go !"
" I obeyed. Unlike you."
" French forces are about to cut off the city entirely, we must catch him, overtake the escort, end this folly."
" For someone who has been openly hoping for his demise," the old suit ironized, "you now seem quite resolved to save him, from himself if needs be."
" I need him to step in and demand peace, as he did in '47. We do not have the reserve to push the French back to the sea, we must negotiate. Denounce Gaillard for a traitor and execute him, give up the continental holdings as a gesture of good faith."
" How convenient for you, thus to eliminate your avowed rival."
" How convenient for you to shirk danger and sit behind your walls. Give my men their weapons back ; we do not need the help of your Coolie Guard."
The man looked as if he had been slapped, but he grinned and let them go. Weird times and bad times made it hard to tell friend for foe, but with a million enemy troops in England killing other Normans was an ever worse bargain.

" This has Gaillard written all over it," Richard commented once they were back in the lead Renart. " I knew Rollon was in cahoots with him, the smart bastard. It was brillant thinking about the old man's lost son, only that could get him out of Dyfed. But I don't know what they plan to do with him in London. Maybe force the militia to fight to the last ? Regardless, it's stupid beyond measure. London will fall, and if they get the king in person..."
The bearded giant shifted his frame uneasily. His massive brawn and rare bathing made him a somewhat unpleasant travel companion in the cramped backseat of a Renart Sport.
"So the plan is ?"
"We get in the capital while there is still a few roads open, look for Gaillard through bombed, burning ruisn and street fighting, confront himwith your six men, grab the king and head out God knows how. An other lieutenant would try to dissuade me."
Lovell grunted. "Just be glad I come with you at all. I care not for your royal squabbles."
" You should. I am sure you are somehow linked to that Prince Roger story."
" And why is that ?"
" Because you look exactly like the prince would, had he lived to your age."

Next episode tomorrow.
 
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Well I figured what had been good enough against Germany would be good enough against France. I was horribly wrong...
 
The last AAR (2/5)​
Kuipy (Normandy)​

"Gaillard ? Gaillard the bastard ? He's dead," a bearded desertor had told them. "Shot by French forty-eight hours ago. Now things are going crazy, no order or orders whatsoever."
And indeed they had not been challenged on the way to the Grey Club, Gaillard's once headquarter. With the pretender and warlord dead, his senior officers had apparently all but lost it. Several of them positively loitered in the velvet appartments of the club, others chain-smoked hagardly, bent over maps of the ruined capital, or snored drunk on benches. Richard's party barged in completely unopposed. Lovell's first instinct was to gun the rats down but Richard thought better of it.
" Where's the king ?" he asked a drunkard after shaking him bodily.
The man opened wide eyes as he recognized him, but then just shrugged an drooled.
" Upstairs. With his son."
Richard and Lovell looked at each other. And then machinegun fire burst, less than a block away. Someone swore.
" French ! They're here !"
And just then they heard two gunshots upstairs.

Next episode tomorrow.
 
Rather so.

The last AAR (3/5)​
Kuipy (Normandy)​

Lovell wasted no time, ordering his men to the windows even as he and Richard hurried up the staircase. When he pushed the door, ready to fire, he expected the old man lying dead, his snowy white beard smeared with gore ; he expected the killer and the pistol, but what he had not expected was the face in front of him, his exact face, only smoother and clean-shaven, not roughened by ten years of dangers and tribulations.

In surprise hee froze, and so did the other man. Almost at once they raised their guns ; but this one time he was not as fast, as reckless, as lucky as he had been so far. This one time he did not have the first shot.

At three he lost the count of the bullets passing through him ; when he fell Richard was already fallen under him. A thousand dying thoughts went through his head. Who was that man, standing tall in the spinning room ? Why his own face ? Robert, Richard, Gaillard... Why kill them ? Was there no Normandies alive now ? Then he remembered the one thought that mattered. His hand would soon grow limp, but it had not let go of his own gun. He clenched his teeth and with the last of his strength, raised it.

This one time he had not had the first shot. But this time again, before darkness engulfed him, he had the last.

What ? Does that mean the Normandies are all dead ?
Next episode tomorrow.
 
Generally it's true ; but Normandies are a special (and often basket) case. For one thing there were never that many of them ; after all from the Crusader Kings day it is painfully obvious they have a chronical fertility problem - how many times did I have to scramble for a bastard cousin ? Add to that hereditary traits like morbid obesity and sociopathy, and you can guess how many distaff branches ended.

And we reached the 1767, when William IV killed his own uncle and killed his uncle Gaillard III with his own hands. Now, William's claim was tenuous at best, seeing as he was a heathen soldier of fortunes who claimed to be the long-lost son of Prince Robert, saved from the Indian rising by a (in?)conveniently died soldier and raised as a sacred killed by Kali priests in seclusion. All that went for him was a certain ressemblance with his avowed father, his personal prestige and the army of fanatic thugs under him.

So, although I may have not spellt it out, that was a pretty bad time for being called "de Normandie", and you can be certain he spent however long of his long reign it took to extirpate mercilessly the lesser branches of the dynasty, which strengthened his rule in several ways:
- it removed the people who had the most interest to challenge his succession
- it made him and his descendant the only "viable" options
- it made the point that he was a heathen badass tyrant and that you should'nt mess with him.

So yes, the only real Normandies around were William IV's last descendants : Robert, Gaillard and Richard, and, if you believe he is'nt dead, Robert's long-lost son Roger. Others may have survived, but they certainly don't call themselves Normandie and have'nt for over a century. Note that Gaillard III had no son, so any candidate traces his claim from, at the very latest, Robert X, in the 1720s, so they would have as much political clout as a Jacobite candidate in post-WWI Britain. That is, not much.
 
The last AAR (4/5)​
Kuipy (Normandy)​

"Wake up, Grant. It's your last day on Earth, make the most of it."
The light seared mercilessly through his closed eyelids. Thirsty and dizzy, Lovell tried to rise on the bed, but pain and handcuffs kept him in place. He groaned at the general sitting a yard away from him.
" Bois-Guilbert. In French rags."
" That name will serve, though it's not my real one. Neither's the uniform. I am Demetrios Evergetes, of the Roman Intelligence Service."

Lovell cared not for this discussion, but obviously Bois-Guilbert was in a gloating mood.
"So vain of you all, to think you stood a chance. Did your would-be-king really think it was beyond Rollon's skill to send a message he could not decipher ?"
" Rollon's a Greek spy too?"
" Quite the overstatement. But he did work for us before he became Head of State."
" Head of State ? What are you talking about ?"
" Normandy. Its king is dead, so are the pretenders – the serious ones, I mean. A situation unprecedented during the last nine centuries, and one Rollon planned and meant to take advantage of. As we speak he has taken power and proclaimed martial law. In a few hours all potential rivals in the political and military circles will have been rounded up. Some will be tried and blamed for what happened here, the others disposed of discretely. Someone as independent-minded as you would probably not have liked the new order he means to impose, I think. "
" What is that to your country ?"
" Which one ? Greece, France, Normandy ? With its initial success, France was seeking out terms for a separate peace with the Normandies. But today was a bad day for them. With Robert, Richard and Gaillard dead, we effectively killed any possibility of any separate peace with France. Alive, the three royals divided the Norman people, but dead they will unite it, and their respective partisans will rally for revenge around whoever offers them nuclear retaliation against France."
"Nukular ?"
"The bomb to end all bombs. We will provide it, Rollon will push the button, and the Norman crowd will cheer, nevermind if France can retaliate in kind. As I said, today we crushed any hope for peace. Once I disappear and they hear of what happened under my command the French government will disown the slaughter of your whole reigning dynasty and the subsequent rape of London, but it will be too late. Now your people can lose England and India and a billion men to boot, it will keep fighting on, for ten years or a thousand or however much it takes for our combined industrial strength to crush France. By the time this war is over the world will be in ashes, but what little remains Rollon will only have to share Diomedes II, or whoever sits on the Byzantine throne. Maybe it'll be me. Who knows. For all his faults Rollon does believe in quid pro quo."
" And me ? What do I have to do with it ?"
" You would have nothing to do with it if it was for me ; I always saw you as too unhinged ; if the rôle of a lost-and-found-prince was to be played, a Byzantine agent with enough cosmetic operation could easily do it. But Rollon was too impress by your uncanny ressemblance with Robert's son to give you up entirely as a potential asset. In a strange turn of events, we were both right. My agent lured Robert and Richard to London to die, but, being expendable, you can serve another purpose."
" You expect me to die ?"
" No, mister Grant, I expect you to talk. But then, yes, we'll let you die. In front of thousands, and by firing squad. There will be photographs and newsreels of it ; fifteen minutes of glory, if you will, but under a false name. First I will have you declare yourself publicly Roger, Robert's son, King of the Normans. Under penalty of... pain."

Lovell did not even think of bragging he could withstand it.
"Rollon will not be content will half the ashes of the World. When France falls he will come for you, and then you will need Roger X against him. Keep me. Show the world your spy's corpse."
"A tempting offer, indeed. But like I said I don't trust you, nor do I think anybody should. And before the problem even arises I have to make sure we Greeks triumph of the French, which means ascertaining continued Norman participation in the War, which means killing the Normandies. Public execution of their very last, forgotten scion will top it up nicely."
"Then have me write a letter."
"I am afraid I cannot allow that."
"To Rollon."
"Now you have me interested."
The fake general looked expectantly as Lovell struggled to write his last words in handcuffs. When he finally looked at the few scribbled lines he winced.
"Is that true ?"
"I don't know. I don't care. I just want him to never have a good sleep until we get reunited in Hell."
"I guess we owe you that." Bois-Guilbert folded the paper carefully. "A last drink ?"

Well, those are some rushed conclusions to long-standing arcs. Way to give up too early, Blackmist.:D
 
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaand...

The last AAR (5/5)​
Kuipy (Normandy)​

Dear general,
The true Hugues is still alive. Guess where.

Regards,
Lovell

Thank you for playing/following guys. Two/882 exciting years indeed.
 
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